Learning to love radically. World changer.

4:50am

I murdered through thick and thin.
Drowned it in Patrón,
suffocated it with darkness.
You abandoned in it for the long haul.Changed your mind,
lied, left me in shadow, in blindness.

They said give up and I cried you don’t get it, I can’t.

As inconceivable as it was for
you, after weeks of excuses,
to humbly expose your veins, deliver a craved truth,
and genuinely search for desire
in the browns of my irises,
you did.

As absurd as it was for me to think
that you, avoidant and bruised,
would ever extend an invitation to begin again,
you did.

As far-fetched as it was, I prayed
that our invisible, dissonant score
would appear and give us the chance to rewrite a piece
more alluring, more harmonious. And in time,
it did.

We cleared our throats of lumps
and morphed oxygen into broken, scattered prose
that prompted my heart to go berserk,
your mind to daydream,
my muscles to relax, your eyes to close, and my arms to
want to reach for you fearlessly.

But I wasn’t all at once fearless.

Tears welled up in confusion
when you said come here,
because you were my greatest paradox.
With one hand on my face and the other held by yours,
I allowed my confusion to slowly unwind into resolution.

You had closed doors and ruthlessly smashed me into a cardiac,
but then you opened windows
and spent time compressing my chest and
breathing me again.
You faced our unknown, forgave,
and convinced my body that it would indeed be safe
next to yours.

What can I even write that
would do justice for how much you are?

You are extraordinary,
a marvelous, breathtaking canvas
comprised of my most favorite hues,
brilliantly bright and equally wonderful.

You excite,
you stupefy.

I speak your name to have my lips know joy.
That syllable does not know how to travel
alongside sadness anymore.
When my alarm sounds,
I, having dreamt of you, no longer wish for sleep eternal,
because you’re more than a memory,
more than imagination now.

Much has changed.

You’re real again.
You were real back then,
but my days were too long, too hazy, too messy.
You were exhausted and spent.

We were broken and then we were gone.

But you’re real again.
You’re real when my phone vibrates in the left pocket of
those dress pants I wear to work.
You’re real when you ring the doorbell of the house
where we first breathed the same air.
I know you’re real because you took my hand last weekend
and whispered, you’re worth fighting for,
and those words rooted themselves soul deep,
vitalizing every piece of you I had held onto.
You were next to me, real and content.

You were real when I realized that
I didn’t need to miss you anymore.

You’re real when you place your head on my chest
and tangle us further. From dusk until dawn,
Fear cannot find a home in the sliver of space
that remains between us. It simply can’t exist there.
And from dawn until dusk, our hope sets Fear on fire.
We laugh until our faces ache as it runs up and down the backyard,
screaming. We trust in who we can become and that faith
terrifies Terror and Doubt. They cannot touch us.

But you were most real that Saturday at 2am
when you guided my hand to your heartbeat.

We are becoming whole;
redefining who we are to each other
as people, as friends, as partners,
as a silly, astrological crab and lion,
as me, the moon, and you, the sun.

Carefully ready,
we are miraculous.
We are a passionate force
resurrecting a promising reality.

We are rising.
We are enough.
We will grow.
We will be better.

I prayed that our invisible, dissonant score
would appear and give us the chance to rewrite a piece
more alluring, more harmonious.